An Alberta man is facing charges after he was allegedly caught videotaping a movie at a Calgary theatre.
Calgary police say the man is charged with unauthorized recording of a movie following an alleged incident in December.
Police say they were called to a theatre in northeastern Calgary after someone called them about a suspicious person complaint. When they arrived at the theatre, police say they were given additional information by a member of a security company that had been investigating the suspect for the previous six months.
Officers then went into the theatre, where they say the suspect was allegedly recording the Tim Burton movie "Sweeney Todd" starring Johnny Depp with a concealed camcorder. Twenty-year-old Richard Craig Lissaman is facing charges under a new law passed last June.
"Anytime an individual goes into a movie theatre and captures a motion picture by way of photographic or video recording, it's now considered unlawful," Calgary Police Det. Asif Rashid told CTV Calgary.
Police say Lissaman is the first person in Alberta to face charges of illegally recording a movie and it's only the second time that such a charge has been laid in Canada. Those charged under the new law could face two years in jail.
Movie critic Rod Gustafson says the problem of illegal movie recording has become a big problem for moviemakers.
"This is becoming a major financial leak for the film industry," said Gustafson.
Industry insiders say some cities, such as Calgary, are well known for movie piracy. The industry has now started fighting back aggressively against the illegal practice.
"We started conducting a tremendous amount of training with theatres, surveillance in theatres in Calgary, and some other investigative actions as well," said Michael Robinson, director of anti-piracy operations for the Motion Picture Association of America.
Industry officials in the U.S. have long complained that Canada has been lax in curbing illegal recording of movies. They have claimed in the past that as much as 50 per cent of pirated movies have come from Canada. In 2006, Canada was placed on a watch list of countries that have not taken enough political action to cut down movie piracy.
"The costs of intellectual property lost by firms such as the Canadian Motion Picture Distribution Association are huge and those costs are passed on to movie theatres and consumers alike," said Rashid.
After his arrest, police executed a search warrant at Lissaman's home, where they seized computer and other electronic equipment.
With a report from CTV Calgary's Kevin Green
